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The Book Thief
The Book Thief is a novel written by Australian author Markus Zusak. It is set in Nazi Germany and recounts the story of Liesel, a 9 years old girl. The book is narrated by a personification of Death. Plot The story begins with Death talking about his first encounter with the book thief. Liesel Meminger, a 9 years old girl, her brother Werner and their mother are going to Molching, Germany, where Liesel and Werner would live with foster parents because their mother couldn't take care of them. On the train, Werner dies suddenly. Liesel and her mother are forced to get off the train to bury him in a cemetery not far from the train station. They are escorted by two grave diggers. After the funeral, Liesel finds a book on the ground entitled The Grave Digger's Handbook and decides to take it. The book belongs to one of the grave diggers. This is the first book she steals. After this, Liesel and her mother continue their journey. They seperate in Munich where Liesel drives to 33 Himmel Street, Molching, to meet her foster parents. Her foster parents are Hans and Rosa Hubermann, a middle aged couple. Hans is a tall man and has silver eyes. He loves to play the accordion and to smoke cigarettes that he rolls himself. He paints buildings for a living. He is very quiet, "not noticeable". Rosa is very short and has a wrinkled face. She swears a lot. She does the washing and ironing for five of the wealthier houses in Molching. She tells Liesel to call her Mama and to call Hans Papa. The couple also has two children, Hans Jr and Trudy, which are grown and both left the house. Liesel finds trouble to fit in in the beggining. She has nightmares about her brother and does bad in school due to her inability to read. Her papa then took the habit of going to her bedroom every night to calm her down. One night, he finds The Grave Digger's Handbook which was hidden under Liesel's mattress. He decides to teach Liesel how to read. From that day, everytime Liesel would wake up in the middle of the night because of her nightmares, Hans would come to her room, bring out The Grave Digger's Handbook, and start a reading lesson. Sometimes, they would go to the basement for the lesson, and Liesel would write all the words she didn't understand on the wall with paint. Her relationship with her papa became very strong. Things are starting to get better for Liesel. She becomes friends with one of her classmates, a boy named Rudy Steiner, who is a big fan of Jessie Owens. She also starts to help Rosa delivering the ironings to her clients. For Christmas, she receives two books from her foster parents. Hans Jr and Trudy came to spend the holiday. Later in the evening, an argument starts between Hans Jr and his father. Hans Jr doesn't like the idea that his father did not join the Nazi party yet and calls him a coward. He leaves the house furiously. On Adolf Hitler's birthday, April 20th 1940, Liesel attends a book burning where books that are considered a threat for the system are burned. She manages to steal her second book from the fire, but she is seen by the mayor's wife Ilsa Hermann, who is one of Rosa's customer. Meanwhile Liesel's book thievery activities, her papa is planning on inviting a Jew to live in the house. His name is Max Vandenburg and he is the son of a good friend of Hans that saved his life during World War I. Hans sends the Jew a copy of Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler, with train tickets and all the informations he needs in it. Max arrives in Himmel Street one night in bad shape. He is taken care of and will be sleeping in the basement. Hans makes sure Liesel doesn't tell anybody about Max and she promises not to. Liesel is anxious about delivering the ironing to the mayor's wife after what had happened at the book burning. It turns out Ilsa Hermann is a kind woman. She lets Liesel go in her library to read as often as she wants. The little girl also befriends with Max. She comes to the basement every day after school and brings him a newspaper so he can work on the crossword puzzles. She tells him what the weather looks like since he can't get out. Max also writes a small illustrated story for her called The Standover Man ''and gives it to her on her birthday as a present. With the war's progression, people are deprived of the less important things. Rosa Hubermann loses all her customers one by one, the last one being Ilsa Hermann. Liesel learns the news when she receives a book from Ilsa that contains a letter explaining how sorry she was about firing her mama. The little girl becomes furious at the mayor's wife. She throws the book at her, seeing it as a gift given from pity, and leaves the house. After this, Liesel starts to steal books from Ilsa's library with the help of her best friend Rudy. Max becomes seriously ill and loses consciousness for a few weeks. During that time, Hans, Rosa and Liesel are really worried about him. Liesel reads to him two to three times a day. She reads the books stolen from Ilsa Hermann's library. She also leaves small presents for him. He recovers from his illness and everyone is released. He then decides to start to write another illustrated story that he would give Liesel when she is ready. Liesel continues to steal books from the mayor's wife's library. One day, she manages to steal a dictionary. The dictionary contains a letter for her from Ilsa Hermann. It says that she knew about Liesel stealing from her library, that she would like her to stop doing it, and that she could keep the books and the dictionary. The air raids are beginning in Molching. Every time people hear the sirens (announcing the city may get bombed), they have to get to the closest shelter from their house. Liesel took the habit to read one of her books in the shelters to calm everybody down. Max cannot join Hans, Rosa and Liesel in the shelters so he stays in the basement. After one of the raids, the Hubermanns' neighbor Frau Holtzapfel asks Liesel to come to her house every week to read her a chapter of her books. Two weeks later, a parade of Jews on their way to the concentration camp of Dachau are crossing Molching. Hans sees how miserable they look and tries to give a piece of bread to one of them. A soldier sees him and both Hans and the Jew get whipped. Because of his action, Hans is expecting to be taken away by the Gestapo. He sends Max away just in case they come in the house and find him. One day, the Gestapo come to Himmel Street, but not for the reason Hans thinks they are. They come to ask Alex Steiner, Rudy's father, to take Rudy to a special school because of his special skills in athletics. Alex refuses. A few days later, Hans receives a letter telling him he has been admitted to the Nazi party and has to leave for the army. He understands that he is sent away because of what he did, he is being punished. Alex Streiner receives the same letter for refusing to send Rudy to the school. A few things happens following Hans's departure. Rosa decides to give Max's illustrated story to Liesel. The story is called ''The Word Shaker and is about the power of words and its effect on Nazi Germany. Liesel goes back to steal in Ilsa Hermann's library, but this time she gets caught in the act by Ilsa, who lets her go once again. She also meets Frau Holtzapfel's son. His name is Michael Holtzapfel, and he is here to tell his mother that his brother Robert had died on a battle in Stalingrad. When she learns the news, the woman becomes indifferent to everything. Michael is worried about his mother, he asks himself why does he get to live and not Robert. The air raids are still threatening Molching. Hans is sent home because of his broken leg, which makes Liesel and Rosa very happy. On one raid, Michael Holtzapfel comes in the Hubermann's house and asks for their help. His mother, instead of running to the shelter, won't leave her kitchen. Liesel tries to make her come by saying that if she doesn't, Liesel will stop reading to her and she would have lost her only friend. Holtzapfel shows up in the shelter a few moments later. When the sirens resound, announcing the threat is gone, the people of Himmel Street find a crashed plane close to the street. Rudy decides to put a teddy bear in the arms of the plane's pilot. The pilot thanks him before Death pick up his soul. Weeks later, another group of Jews are being paraded through Molching. This time, Liesel sees Max Vandenburg among them. She rushes in and go talk to Max. She tries to get him out, but she is pushed by a soldier. She tries to go after Max again but she is stopped and carried away by Rudy. After this, Liesel tells him everything about Max, and he promises not to tell anyone. The book thief decides to steal again. She sneeks in Ilsa Hermann's library for a book, but she finds herself filled with anger as she goes through the shelves. She grabs books and tear their pages apart. After realizing the mess done in the library, she decides to write a letter to Ilsa saying how sorry she is. Three days later, Ilsa knocks on the Hermanns' door. She gives Liesel a small black book of lined pages and tells her she was amazed by the letter Liesel wrote and that she should write her own book. For several days, Liesel goes to her favorite room in the house, the basement, every night, to write in the black book. She writes about her life in Himmel Street, the people she loves, the people she lost, the people she missed. On one night, while she's in the basement writing in her book, an air raid hits Himmel Street. Nobody hears the sirens so nobody goes to the shelters. Nobody is protected against the bombs. Everybody living on that street, everybody Liesel knew dies from the raid. She is the only survivor. After hearing the survival of Liesel, Ilsa Hermann adopts her. Alex Steiner returns to Himmel Street and regrets not having sent Rudy to boarding school. Max is liberated from Dachau and comes to visit her. At the end of the book, Death says he took Liesel's soul in Sydney. He shows her the small black book she used to write in when she was living in Himmel Street which he picked up the day after the bombing. Characters *'Liesel Meminger (the Book Thief)': She is the protagonist of the book. She is nine years old when her brother dies and she is sent away to Molching, far away from her mother, to live wtih her foster parents Hans and Rosa Hubermann. She was the only one on Himmel Street to survive the bombing that hit Molching. *'Hans Hubermann': He is Rosa Hubermann's husband and Liesel's foster father. He was sent away to fight in both World Wars, and survived both. He is described as a tall man with siver eyes. He is very calm and kind hearted and, unlike all Germans at that time, he liked Jews. He helped Max Vandenburg, the son of the Jew who saved his life in World War I, hide in his own basement. He absolutly loves his family and tought his foster daughter how to read. He is a building painter and also plays the accordion. He was killed in the bombing that hit Molching. *'Rosa Hubermann': She is married to Hans Hubermann and she is the foster mother of Liesel. She is a short woman and always wear her hair in a bun. She swears a lot at the people she loves the most. She does the washing and ironing for 5 of the wealthier houses of Molching. She was killed in the bombing that hit Molching. *'Rudy Steiner': He is Liesel's best friend. He is the second of a family of six children. He loves to play soccer and is a huge fan of Jessie Owens. He is stubborn and likes to fight. He was killed in the bombing that hit Molching. *'Max Vandenburg': He is the son of Erik Vandenburg, a Jew who saved Hans during World War I. He spendt his childhood in Stuttgart and loved to fight. He managed to come to Molching after Hans contacted him and the Hubermanns welcomed him in their home. He becomes great friends with Liesel. He had to leave Molching after Hans got caught giving bread to an old Jew. He was then seen by Liesel on his way to Dachau, and later, after his liberation, he came back to Himmel Street. Review I found The Book Thief to be a very good book. I thought it was a little slow in the beginning, but the story was good. The idea of making a personification of Death as the narrator was really original. I liked the personification on itself. Death is usually seen as a dark and scary character, but in the book, it has a friendly aspect. The soul he picks up are not his victims, he does not have the power to plan someone's death. His job is just to pick up the souls of the people who are already dead. The author made a personification of Death that is not feared, but welcomed. I liked the fact that you get attached to the characters. I liked Hans's kind heart, the playful personality of Rudy, or even the funny vulgarity of Rosa. It was upsetting to see everyone of them killed by the air raid. It was even sadder to see Liesel deal with the lost of her loved ones. Liesel is a strong little girl. She has been throught a lot in the story. Her brother's death that happened right before her eyes, her mother sending her to live with two strangers whom she got attached to and loved very much, the arrival of Max whom she also got attached to, his departure, then her papa's departure, her papa's come back, the sight of Max, miserable, on his way to Dachau, and, finally, losing her foster parents, her best friend and everyone she knew on the street she lived on. All of them killed. At the end of the book, Liesel is adopted by the mayor's wife, Ilsa Hermann. She is back to the place where she used to come to steal books, and even gets a visit from Max. We know she's happy, but she still went throught the sudden death of all the people she loved. I don't know if we can consider this a happy ending.